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CHAPTER XIX
HOMB lUTLK BILL OF 1886
IN the winter of 1885 ParneU had perhaps reached the height of his unpopularity in England, lie had thrust himself into English polities, compromising the Tories and battling the Whigs, The one party had sacrificed principles to court his alliance, the other had sacrificed his alliance to assert principles inconsistent with the Liberal faith. The former had gone to the country with the cry of * no coercion ' inscribed upon their Hag. The latter had gone to the country with the stigma of coercion impressed upon their character. .Both had lost. With Parnoll's support the Tories could meet the House of Commons on equal terms. Without his support the Whigs could not form a Government.
' Until the Irish question in disposed of,1 Parnoll had said at Liverpool on November 10, * it will be utterly impossible for any English question to proceed/ Ho had kept his word. English parties were reduced to a state of impotence. English questions were brushed aside. Ireland held the field,
An amusing incident, significant of English feeling, occurred some time after the General Election, when ParneU was on his way to London. A stranger, an Englishman from South Africa, accosted him on board Gladstone to form a Government with a. working majority of 172. Thus the Irish leader was master of the situation. Parnell wan a thoroughly united Ireland at home and abroad, In military parlance the*, formation of bin army may bo clcflcrihod thuB : in the centre the Parliamentarians; left wing, tho Glan-na-Gael, and many of the rank and file of the I. li B.; right wing, the Catholic Church. With thoso forces, naturally antagonistic, but held together by tho attractive personality and iron will of a great com-* Tho mauifeHto appeared November 21.d, the end that anyd